Its Never Where You Look
by WeAreSuckersForRomance
Summary: Ugh. How could he do this to me? Skulduggery thinks he can just leave to go on this "Great Adventure" while im stuck taking lessons with this weirdo. Life couldn't get any worse could it?
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1.

The man sat tied to the chair. He was already doomed and he knew it. Beaten, bloody and tired, as soon as this bastard was done with him, he would kill him. The man who beat him asked a lot of questions. In the state he was in he wasn't really in the right frame of mind to answer him; however one question managed to leap up at him.

"Where's Cain?" the bad man asked softly almost childishly. The sanctuary agent didn't answer. His insolence was immediately met with the back of the mans hand with force.

"Where. Is. Cain?" he asked again with less patience.

The agent didn't care anymore. He was so very tired. The agent spat blood as he spoke." The Skeleton took her to stay with Lee Grail."

The man with no eyes smiled as he unfolded his straight razor.

"Thank you for your co-operation. Here at Sanguine Assassination Limited we know you have a choice in gruesome deaths. We hope you find yours to be pleasurable and enjoy the rest of your breath." The sanctuary agent could see the blade coming. He sighed. He had a wife and two kids at home. He really hoped they didn't miss him too much. Sanguine then slit his throat and left.

It was a poor excuse of a summer's day in the Irish countryside. The threatening dark clouds had whipped away any opposing sunshine and onslaughts of rain had had beaten even the most stubborn Sunday drivers back into the garage. The only sign of life were a few desperate farmers making brave albeit pathetic attempts to move their cattle under shelter. It truly was a sad, miserable day. A perfect day for driving. Especially for a man with no face and a seventeen year old sorceress. Of course the man with no face was driving. Any other way would have just been silly.

"I still don't understand why you just can't take me with you." The sorceress muttered sourly.

"Because Miss Cain, I simply don't want you to come." the man with no face replied patiently.

"What kind of reason is that?"

"A rather brilliant one, if I may say so."

The Bentley took a sharp corner around the gravel road.

She sighed, "Give me three good reasons why I can't come with you."

"Fine. For starters it's extremely dangerous and requires skill that only hundreds of years in my field can provide. Two, it is top secret information that only I can know about and has been assigned only to me. Thirdly and this is the most important point by the way, I am extremely good looking."

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"Oh nothing. Just thought it needed saying."

"You are very irritating, by the way."

"Perhaps, but being as handsome as I am, I hardly find that relevant."

The sorceress stared at him crossly and gave up. She turned to the window to admire the horrible weather and how applicable it was to her situation. The idea of spending two months stuck in a house with a man she doesn't know didn't sound very appealing. Especially as Skulduggery is going out to have daring and amazing adventures without her. However, she was falling behind in her elemental lessons and she knew it, so when she was offered tutoring while he was away she knew she had to take it up. The Bentley left the farms behind and ventured further out into the nothingness where the grass oddly didn't seem as green and few trees seemed to grow. It was eerie.

"Isn't there someone I know that could teach me?" she whined.

"You know very well that there is no-one else. Everyone's either dead or extremely busy, so no."

"Don't you care about the amount of danger I'm in without you?"

"No not really besides I trust Grail more than I would many others."

"How well do you even know this guy?"

"Grail fought by my side once a few years ago. He saved my life, you know."

"And you're repaying him by dumping me with him?"

"Yes. I suppose I am."

"You're nice."

"I even surprise myself sometimes."

How long has he sat there crossed legged on his mat? All day perhaps. Out here in the middle of nowhere time is something you tend to lose grip of. Its importance is limited when you have as much of it as you want. Grail exhaled slowly. He felt like an old hermit living out here. Maybe he was turning into one. He wore a sash belt, long pants and strap leather boots with his usual brown and beige robes with a hood that covered his face. He turned his attention back onto cleaning his sword. It resembled something of a katana without the hilt. It was a deep pure purple that didn't glisten in the sun like other swords. It was cold, dull and sharp. Just how he liked it. He touched the centre of the sword and relaxed as the vibrations of the sword sung to him. However the relaxation was short lived as a sound from outside the house distracted him. It was a reminder how little noise there actually was out here. To be frank he didn't really miss it. He could hear a car approaching his driveway. He put his hood up, his sword away and approached the front door. He just hoped she wasn't going to be annoying.

The house they approached was exactly how Valkyrie imagined it to be. Small and shoddy. Fantastic. The small house was surrounded by acres of land on each side with a barn several yards out to the back of it. As they got closer they could see a figure covered with robes at the door. He stood tall and strong but his face was covered by a hood and that creeped her out. The Bentley kicked up gravel as the car stopped.

"Remember to play nice." Skulduggery reminded her.

"Yes, mum." She replied dryly.

Valkyrie stayed in the car as Skulduggery got out of the car to greet him. The two men shook hands and exchanged a few words before Skulduggery started walking back to the car. He signalled her to come out.

"I'm sure you two will have bundles of fun together." Skulduggery chirped happily.

"I'm sure." She sighed as she stepped out and closed the car door.

"Well, I had to get away from you some time, didn't I?"

She laughed and hugged him, her hands easily fitting around his skeletal structure. He laughed too and returned the hug.

"I'll miss you." She said.

"And I you, but me being me, you'll probably miss me more. Now run along. You have some bonding to do." And with that he slid back into the car and started the engine. Valkyrie turned to face her new mentor.

"Hi." She smiled without trying to sound too depressed. He stared at her for a moment then spoke.

"Hi." He replied gruffly.

She immediately disliked his voice. It sounded put on. It sounded fake.

"I'm Valkyrie."

"I know." Silence. "Grab your stuff. I'll show you where you'll sleep." And with that he walked inside and left her alone.

"Such the gentleman," She thought to herself as she heaved her bags up the porch. Not that she would have taken it, but an offer to help would have been nice. She turned back to the road to see Skulduggery driving off into the sunset. She hoped he was going to have good time because she doubted very much she was.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2.

When she entered the house she was pleasantly surprised. It was well furnished, clean, smelled okay and wasn't infested with rats, which was a bonus. It was small, though, not that she minded.

He led her to her room. It was small with a single sized bed in one corner and cupboard in the other.

"Unpack. Dinner will be served in an hour," he informed her. Valkyrie nodded. She figured he wasn't too good with first impressions, so she was going to have to be patient with him. She filled the hour by exploring the house. It had two bedrooms, a bathroom, kitchen and a lounge. She found that there were no lights and Grail informed her that there was no electricity out here. It wasn't very flash but she figured for a guy out on his own he didn't need much. Dinner was basically one, long, awkward silence. He didn't appear to have much to say to her and she didn't have the slightest idea how to spark any conversation, so they mostly ate in silence. She made several attempts to see under his hood but quickly turned away, embarrassed every time he caught her. He seemed to notice her unease and thought he might as well try to say something.

"Is their something wrong with your food?" he asked.

"No, its fine, thanks."

Silence.

"Sorry. It's been awhile since I've been in someone else's company."

She tried a smile. "Well, I kinda figured. It'll have been unlikely living all the way out here by yourself."

"I don't live here all by myself, thank you."

She was surprised. "Someone else lives here?"

"Yes. Ludwig stays with me occasionally."

"What kind of name is Ludwig?" Just on cue, a cat trotted from Grail's door and started rubbing her face on his leg.

"A cat's name." he stated defensively. Valkyrie laughed so hard she nearly choked on her food.

"You have a cat?" she cried in disbelief.

Grail was taken aback, "What's so hard to believe about that?"

"Sorry." She apologised, managing to regain some composure. "You just striked me as the kind of guy who's all got the whole 'Lone Warrior' thing going on."

"I'm not a complete hermit you know."

"What about real people? Don't you have any friend's that visit?

"I suppose not."

"Family?" Valkyrie had known as soon as she asked that she had struck a wrong chord. His hooded head tilted a bit before he stood and started to leave the table. Valkyrie stood but he spoke before she could apologise.

"Don't worry about it." He reassured her, "Your training starts tomorrow at seven. Don't make me wait." With that he closed his bedroom door and left Valkyrie feeling horrible.

Later that night Valkyrie was still feeling guilty. It was her first day here and she was worried that she may have already offended him. True, she insulted and mocked people on a rather shocking basis and never spared them a second thought but that was always on purpose. She felt she had to make amends, so she left her room and made her way to his. She slowly opened the door to find him sitting on a mat crossed legged, back facing her in deep concentration. Something wasn't right though. He was clouded in a strange translucent blue heat and it took her a moment to notice, but objects around the room were levitating. She stared in amazement as books, pens, candles and even his bookshelf joined in floating in a graceful dance around the room. All emitting the same strange blue heat as Grail.

"Wow." She whispered. Everything floating suddenly shook and crashed to the floor. Valkyrie yelped embarrassingly high. A shameful "Sorry," was all she could muster. Grail for his part didn't seem too bothered and stayed where he sat.

He sighed. "It's fine. Go get some rest. Its going to be an early start tomorrow."

"Yes, right. Sorry again. About tonight. I had no idea it was that personal and…"

"Valkyrie, its okay. Really."

"Okay. Goodnight then."

"Goodnight." His head tilted slightly toward her as she was leaving. "They're dead, Valkyrie." She nodded and closed the door.

Tanith kicked through the door to Scapegraces pub. When there was no-one in she broke open a cabinet, poured herself some brandy, sat on a stool and waited. If they were going to kill her they would a distraction and nothing is more distracting than a hungry horde of zombies.

32 minutes later the Zombie King himself burst through the door with that bumbling idiot in tow.

"Vaurien." She greeted with the sweetest smile she could.

Scapegrace stared at her in shock before he finally managed to say anything.

"Oh. Hi." Then he ran.

"Oh goody." She said to herself. She kicked of her chair and strolled casually towards the door. Thrasher saw his master in trouble. He knew he had to save him. Maybe then he would gain the appreciation he craved and maybe, just maybe, he could wipe the bar tables again. Thrasher jumped in front of the door way and made a brave last stand between his master and the interloper.

"Madam, I'm sorry but I cannot let you pass." he tried bravely. However he only got halfway through his sentence before a swift stroke of her sword took the his head clean off. Tanith left the headless zombie flailing around the pub and took chase to Scapegrace. Admittedly it wasn't that hard to catch up to a staggering zombie that had to focus more on keeping his sown head on his shoulders than he could on running and within seconds he was on the ground.

"Please don't kill me." He begged

"You're already dead." She replied. God he was an idiot.

"Yeah but like dead, dead y'know?"

She sighed. "I'm not going to kill, kill you, okay?"

"Thank you." he said as managed to regain some composure.

"You're going to do a favour for me, okay?"

"Yeah, uh, okay."

"I'm going to need you to round me up some zombies okay."

"Uh, sure but um I have done this before and it didn't really work out so mayb-" He was cut short by Tanith who heaved him of the ground and brought his head close to hers.

"Listen to me you walking sack of compost," her lips were starting to turn black and dark veins started protruding from her neck. She whispered calmly in his ear. "You are going to get me one-hundred zombies in two days or I will come back and I will kill, kill you, okey dokey?"

"Okey dokey," He quivered. She dumped him on the ground and left him to sob quietly.


End file.
